SEC coaches still debating schedules

Sunday

Apr 28, 2013 at 12:01 AMApr 28, 2013 at 1:00 AM

Dave Matter

It wouldn't be a gathering of Southeastern Conference coaches — whether on a conference call or in Destin, Fla., at the league's spring meetings — without a breathless discussion of the SEC's polarizing concept of cross-division permanent rivals.

The league's uniform schedule will kick into gear in 2014, with all seven teams from the Eastern Division playing their permanent rival from the Western Division. For now, the six previously established matchups will resume this fall — Florida-LSU, Georgia-Auburn, Tennessee-Alabama, Vanderbilt-Ole Miss, South Carolina-Arkansas and Kentucky-Mississippi State — but in 2014, Missouri and Arkansas are expected to become cross-division rivals, as will Texas A&M and South Carolina.

One way or the other, most coaches continue to take a firm stance on the topic

"If we want to be fair we would not have permanent crossover opponents," South Carolina's Steve Spurrier said during last week's SEC spring teleconference. "We talked about that last year. Tennessee's got Alabama, who I guess has been the best team for the last three or four years. That's not fair for Tennessee to play those guys every year.

"Of course, LSU and Florida play every year. I don't know, heck, that's just sort of the way it is. The coaches, we don't make the rules. We just try to coach our teams the best we can. Nobody said it was supposed to be fair anyway."

At last year's spring meetings, the league adopted the 6-1-1 scheduling policy, under which teams would play the other six teams in their division, one permanent rival from the other division and a rotating team from the other division. That means six years would pass before teams play all seven teams in the other division.

LSU's Les Miles, whose team faces one of the league's better teams every year in cross-division rival Florida, suggested scrapping the permanent crossovers and using a computer model to randomly configure the schedules.

His counterpart in the annual LSU-Florida showdown wasn't on the same page.

"We've exhausted this" topic "pretty good," Gators Coach Will Muschamp said. "I know the Florida-LSU game is a really good game for our conference. I totally understand what Les is saying. Again, those decisions aren't made by the coaches. We can voice our opinions."

That is something Alabama Coach Nick Saban has done repeatedly. He favors a different scheduling philosophy, not necessarily to get the Crimson Tide out of its yearly matchup with Tennessee.

"One basic theory that I have is every player should have the opportunity in his four-year career to play every SEC school," Saban said. "If we don't have at least a two-team rotation with the other side, East-West whatever you're in, that doesn't really happen. The one fixed opponent and the other" rotating opponent "means you're going to play some teams every six, seven years. I think it makes it more league-oriented when we play more cross-division games."

There's less debate among the coaches on the topic of moving from eight to nine conference games. Coaches whose teams play long-standing nonconference games with in-state rivals are universally opposed to adding a conference game. That would be coaches from Florida (Florida State), Georgia (Georgia Tech) and South Carolina (Clemson).

A ninth league game could also cause schools to water down already bland nonconference schedules. This fall, Mississippi State plays Oklahoma State, Georgia plays Clemson, Alabama plays Virginia Tech, LSU plays TCU, Tennessee plays Oregon and Ole Miss plays Texas. SEC schools might decide against such high-profile but risky matchups if nine league games loom on the schedule.

"The eight games allows the flexibility for all of us to manage our teams and build our programs the way we need to," Vanderbilt's James Franklin said. "If people want to go out and schedule really good games with a Pac-10 opponent or a Big 12 opponent or whatever's high-profile, then that's great, go do it with the Big Ten or whoever it is."

A BORDER WAR REBORN: Arkansas Coach Bret Bielema has no beef with his team's eventual cross-division rival. While Missouri's Gary Pinkel initially hoped to be aligned with Texas A&M, the new Razorbacks coach is happy to have the Tigers as a permanent opponent, which is expected to begin in 2014, though the league has not released schedules for seasons beyond 2013.

"Obviously they're one of the newer teams in the SEC, but one of the things we really need is to set that game up at the end of the year to make sure you have that look and that dynamic that's a constant," Bielema said. "Because of the region, because of recruiting, it would be a natural rivalry."

CROWDED HOUSE(S): Judging by the attendance at their team's spring games, the four new coaches in the SEC have already generated enthusiasm without coaching a game. The schools with new coaches — Arkansas, Auburn, Kentucky and Tennessee — drew four of the five largest spring game crowds in the SEC, with three of those schools setting attendance records for their final spring scrimmage.

The largest crowd showed up for Auburn's A-Day — a nation-best 83,401 — as Gus Malzahn tries to pump some life back into a program that flat-lined after its 2010 national championship. The Tigers nearly doubled their spring game attendance from 2011 and, perhaps most impressively, outdrew Alabama's crowd of 78,315, the second-largest SEC spring crowd.

"It was really a 'wow' reaction," said Malzahn, who replaced Gene Chizik, for whom he worked as offensive coordinator during the 2010 title season. "We feel like we've got some of the best fans in all of college football. I really feel like they made a statement to the rest of the college football world about Auburn and the Auburn family. It did nothing but give our coaches and our players a shot in the arm. It's going to be great in the future and even recruiting."

At Arkansas, where Bielema looks to restore a program that was on the rise until Bobby Petrino's disastrous motorcycle ride last spring, a record 51,088 fans came out for the Red-White Game.

At Kentucky, where Florida State defensive coordinator Mark Stoops was hired to make the basketball powerhouse more relevant in football, 50,831 showed up for the Blue-White Scrimmage, more than doubling the previous attendance record for the Wildcats' spring game. Last year, only 4,500 showed up for the team's final spring scrimmage.

"The fan base is awful hungry to help us be successful," Stoops said.

And at Tennessee, Butch Jones saw 61,706 attend the Vols' Orange-White Game, the second-largest spring game crowd in team history and an increase by nearly 27,000 fans from last year.

Across the league, 570,262 attended the 14 SEC spring games, an average of 40,733, which would have ranked 61st among FBS teams for 2012 regular-season attendance. This year's average SEC spring game drew more fans than Boise State, Syracuse, Maryland and Washington State averaged for home games last season.

Missouri's Black and Gold Game attendance of 18,384 was smaller than the SEC standard but just 230 fans short of last year's crowd — when the Tigers debuted their redesigned uniforms and helmets — and ranked third overall in MU spring game history. Among SEC teams, only Vanderbilt (14,000) and Florida (10,000) had smaller spring game crowds.

NO SHAW, NO SWEAT: There's no shortage of established quarterbacks returning to SEC teams this year, led by Texas A&M Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel and Alabama two-time national champion A.J. McCarron, plus Georgia senior Aaron Murray and Mississippi State senior Tyler Russell.

South Carolina's Connor Shaw is back after leading the Gamecocks to 11 wins last year, but Spurrier wasn't worried about his senior missing spring practices after having foot surgery. Spurrier called Shaw's situation "a minor setback."

"I guess the reason I'm not so adamant about spring ball is I didn't go through but one in my three years down at Florida," Spurrier said. "I was hurt, had a sprained ankle prior to my senior year. Another year I was kicking an extra point, guy fell on my leg and I had my knee in a cast for three weeks or so. I didn't do a lot in the spring. I just always sort of believed it was a time for the young guys to learn a little bit."

South Carolina's backup situation might be the SEC's best. Dylan Thompson threw 10 touchdowns in relief of Shaw last year, including five TDs the last two games of the year, wins over Clemson and Michigan.